See below for video of Sen. Tim Kaine, speaking a little while ago on the US Senate floor, to (as Sen. Kaine’s office put it):
“…urge the Senate to pass Kaine’s bipartisan War Powers Resolution to stop President Donald Trump’s illegal, unnecessary war in Iran that has already resulted in the loss of four U.S. servicemembers and injury of several others. The bipartisan War Powers Resolution, which will be voted on later this week, would ensure any U.S. participation in hostilities against Iran is explicitly authorized by Congress. It would not prevent the U.S. from defending itself or Israel from an Iranian attack.”
So, according to Sen. Kaine:
“Have we learned nothing from nearly two decades plus of war against Iraq and Afghanistan?…They mean some things that should compel us to learn some lessons…[in Afghanistan] 6,241 deaths, 25,000 injuries, $2.3 trillion should have taught us something…[in Iraq] 8,248 American servicemembers or contractors killed…each one of them had a name, each one of them had a family…each one of them had a future that was never to be. We ought to have learned something from this…Somewhere between 185,000 and 208,000 Iraq civilians were killed…and the total cost of the Iraq war…was $2.9 trillion…If you add up the cost of both of these wars…the total cost to American taxpayers of 25 years of war in Iraq and Afghanistan was nearly $8 trillion…
…First, we should not be going into a war in the Middle East or anywhere without a good solid reason that has had its tires kicked and that has demonstrated that is of a magnitude sufficient to warrant losses that could reach this scale. So what is the reason asserted for going to war with Iran? The president has asserted many reasons. We’re doing it to stop their nuclear program, but he had obliterated it six months ago and he had a diplomatic deal that controlled it that he tore up seven or eight years ago. So, it’s not about the nuclear program. We want to protect Iranian protesters. But wait a minute. This president is deporting to Iran Iranian refugees living in the United States, including Iranian refugees who will be persecuted in Iran because of their religion. He doesn’t care about Iranians being mistreated by the regime. We need to go to war to stop a ballistic missile program. But the intelligence, as publicly reported, suggests that the missile program is not such that would pose danger to the United States mainland for at least a decade. The president tweeted the other night, ‘we should go to war with Iran or suggested because they interfered in the 2020 election.’ He’s blaming them because he still can’t admit that he lost the 2020 election. Is that what we should send our sons and daughters into war for, because the president can’t admit that he lost the 2020 election? Or maybe it’s about oil. What are the two nations that the president has invaded? Venezuela and Iran. Boy, they’re really different nations, except there’s one thing about them that’s in common. They are both oil-producing nations. This president has asserted no real reason that is clear to the American public and that’s why the American public so far is so against this.
And then the other thing is you shouldn’t go in and run this risk with no reasons and even if you have a reason you shouldn’t go in without a plan. So what’s the plan? The president has said it would be two or three days. The president has said it will be five or six weeks. The president has said, ‘I’m not going to rule out boots on the ground.’ The president has said we will bomb until we’re done and then Iranians take over your government. I mean, that’s the plan? We’re going to bomb until we stop and then it’s a jump ball for whoever wants to take over. That’s not a plan. It’s not a plan that is well designed when Kuwait shoots down three US F-15s. Kuwait is an ally. We’re working together with Kuwait. And in the opening days of this, if an ally is shooting down three US F-15s because oh wow, we didn’t realize they were US planes. What kind of a plan is that? There’s no rationale and there’s no plan. And without a rationale or a plan, why would we ignore the lessons of the last 25 years?
Look, I pray just like we all do that the consequences of Iran will not be those that I read to you earlier, the consequences of Iraq and the consequences of Afghanistan. But Iran is a bigger nation than both, with a bigger population than both and a more powerful military than both. We went into Iraq and achieved what many thought was a very prompt victory. Mission accomplished! We will be viewed as liberators! It seemed like it was smooth sailing a month in. And then 10 years later those numbers kept racking up and racking up and racking up. To use Lincoln’s words from his second inaugural, fondly do we hope, fervently do we pray that the consequences of a war against Iran will not be what were the consequences of wars against Iraq and Afghanistan. But we would be foolish to stand here and say we know they will not be. We have to have the humility to acknowledge with the fact that US service members have already lost their lives and been injured, that we could face serious consequences. Serious consequences in the loss and death of our troops. Serious consequences in instability in the region. Serious consequences in rising energy prices for Americans.
Who in the world will be the chief beneficiary of energy prices going up, the cost of oil going up? I’ll tell you who. Vladimir Putin. Russia has an economy that is very centered on oil exports and on the prices of natural gas. And Vladimir Putin has just seen a massive surplus likely come in to the Russian state treasury for a significant period of time as long as energy prices are elevated by this war in the Middle East.
We will have this War Powers vote within the next 48 hours or so. And every member of this body will do the most solemn thing any of us ever do – vote on whether the United States should be at war. That sounds like an abstraction. Vote on whether we want to send our own kids, our own sons and daughters, the most precious resource we have in this country, into a war that could end up like the wars we have just recently exited in the same region. I pray so hard for my colleagues to exercise the judgment that this is not the right time for more war. If more war with Iran would be the answer, we’ve been at war with them essentially since 1953, when we toppled their democratically elected government. And it’s been back and forth for 70 years. Us striking them, them striking us, us striking them, them striking us. Hundreds and hundreds, thousands of people killed. If more war were the answer, we would have found it before now. It’s not the answer now. I pray that colleagues will support the War Powers resolution.”
